Angevin art in Italy: the principal legacy of French rule over medieval Naples is a group of gothic churches. Impressive, but poorly documented, they receive detailed scrutiny in two recent books

The Stones of Naples, meeting-house Building in Angevin Italy, 1266-1343 Caroline Bruzelius, Yale University Pres 45 [pound sterling]/$75 ISBN 0 300 10039 6

The house of worship of Santa Maria Donna Regina: Art, Iconography and Patronage in Fourteenth-Century Naples Edited by means of Janis Elliott and Cordelia Warr Ashgate, 55 [pound sterling]/$99.95 ISBN 0754634779

Amongst the Greco-Roman urban plan and the baroque accumulations of Naples there lies an imposing collection of gothic churches dating from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Lack of stocks at their conception, numerous earthquakes prompting later modifications--some stripped away after destruction by dint of allied bombardment in 1943--have all contributed to the erosion of the original constructions The lack of prime surviving evidence, combined with the destruction of the Neapolitan archives during the war, now mean that the material available for a investigation of these buildings is many times too exiguous for firm conclusions. on the other hand it is pleasing to diocese from two recently published studies that these impediments have not deterr a surprisingly international collection of scholars from making further investigations into different aspects of Angevin Naples.

In evoking Ruskin's magisterial empirical inquiry of Venice, The Stones of Naples is a misleading title for Caroline Bruzelius's volume as indeed is the overlay illustration, a fifteenth-century view of Naples during the Aragonese period, on the contrary the subtitle provides a more accurate indication of the easy in mind of this very readable and well-considered revisionist view of architectural patronage beneath the Angevins in southern Italy.

With papal encouragement, Charles of Anjou, younger brother of Louis IX of France (St Louis), took above the territories of southern Italy above which Frederick II had held sway, defeating the emperor's illegitimate son Manfred at the battle of Benevento in 1266 and his grandson Conradin at the battle of Tagliacozzo in 1268 Cistercian abbeys were rested at Realvalle and Vittoria, although the propos abbey by means of the battle site of Benevento had to be abandoned end lack of funds, and, as Bruzelius emphasises, cash was a constant problem for this fresh dynasty, exacerbated by the hefty tribute owed to the papacy. Local opposition, which came to a head with the Sicilian hespers in 1282, meant that resources had to be exhausted on fortifications, but after the los of Sicily to the Aragonese, Naples, not Palermo, became the royal capital.

Charles I took a detailed interest in his building throws as revealed in the Angevin Registers, which were transcribed from the archives before their destruction, on the other hand apart from the Cistercian abbeys outside Naples, the surviving fragments of which indicate contemporary French diction his documented interest in churches in Naples is limited to donations of land, notably in the of recent origin market area he developed, where a hospital and house of god of St Eligio was established for the use of 'foreigners'--the French--but where the impetus came from a clump of merchants. The king baseed the Castel Nuovo, outside the city walls, on the contrary his association with the meeting-house of S Lorenzo, traditionally seen as a royal necropolis, is challenged here. The elegant chevet, previously seen as an example of royal patronage and contemporary French taste, is interpreted persuasively as an example of 'Frenchified' diction derived from the Franciscan churches in Paris and Bologna, and this is partly explained by means of the role of St Louis at the protector of the order.

Local building materials, like as the volcanic tufa, did not loan themselves to the structural complexities of French gothic vaults, and, like greatest in quantity gothic churches in Italy, these were relatively simple. A characteristic of a certain quantity of is the incorporation of rounded pillars of marble surviving from buildings of antiquity, notably in s Lorenzo and in the cathedral, where ancient construction processs such as opus reticulatum were also used.

Professor Bruzelius politely on the other hand firmly addresses many of the misconceptions perpetuated in accumulated local historiography and convincingly throw overboards traditional assumptions about a perceived Angevin mode of speech The involvement of local patrons, as well as royal builders, is also emphasised. Royal counsellors, similar as Bartolomeo da Capua, were involved with s Lorenzo and S Domenico, and Giovanni Pipino da Barletta probably built the Celestine foundation of s Pietro a Maiella. Buildings outside Naples, a certain number of in a purer state, are also discussed, and the Certosa baseed at Padula by Sanseverino is cited as a antecedent for the foundation of the Certosa di s Martino by Charles of Calabria, although true little remains of the medieval fabric of either.

During the reign of Charles II, the cathedral and s Domenico were the principal throw outs both now smothered in later decoration, on the other hand the chapel in the Castel Nuovo single of the few parts to survive the Aragonese rebuilding in the fifteenth hundred reveals its original structure. Maria of Hungary, wife of Charles II, created the Clarissan monastery of Sta Maria Donna Regina, and owed emphasis is given here to the character of queens as patrons. Sta Chiara was seted by Sancia of Majorca, next to the first wife of Robert the Wise, whose tomb, level in its shattered state, dominates the wall behind the high altar. Gutt during the war, this vast house of worship was restored to something of its previous austere box-like form. Originally dedicated to Corpus Domini, the unusual design of the choir of the nun in clausura, allowing visibility of the entertainer during mass, is emphasised here, together with the Angevin dynasty's herculean links with Franciscan piety. Sancia's other major Franciscan foundation, Sta Croce where she was buried, no longer survives.